UTH AMERICAN 
[ISTORICAL DOCUMENTS 

RELATING CHIEFLY TO THE PERIOD OF 
REVOLUTION 

FROM THE COLLECTION OF 

GEORGE M. CORBACHO 



BY 



WILLIAM R. SHEPHERD 

PROFESSOR OF HISTORY IN COLUMBIA 
UNIVERSITY; MEMBER OF THE HIS- 
PANIC SOCIETY OF AMERICA 




G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS 

NEW YORK AND LONDON 

1919 



SOUTH AMERICAN 
HISTORICAL DOCUMENTS 

RELATING CHIEFLY TO THE PERIOD OF 
REVOLUTION 

FROM THE COLLECTION OF 

GEORGE M. GORBAGHO 



BY 



WILLIAM R. SHEPHERD 

PROFESSOR OF HISTORY IN COLUMBIA 
UNIVERSITY; MEMBER OF THE HIS- 
PANIC SOCIETY OF AMERICA 




G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS 

NEW YORK AND LONDON 
1919 



Copyright, 1919* by 
THE HISPANIC SOCIETY OF AMERICA 



JAN I7|y20 *•" 






Ube Iftnfcfterbocfeer press, IRew l^orfc 

©CI.A559416 



HISTORICAL MANUSCRIPTS 


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SOUTH AMERICAN HISTORICAL 
MANUSCRIPTS 

In these days of rapid change, when old 
empires fall and new nations rise within a 
period of less than five years, it is hard to 
believe that Spain once ruled in America 
for three hundred. She held dominion 
then over the greatest realm that the world 
had ever known. At the time that our own 
country achieved its independence Spain 
was sovereign in a region that stretched 
from northwestern North America to the 
Straits of Magellan. Most of what is now 
the United States formed part of it. And, 
though her political sway has vanished 
long since, eighteen republics perpetuate 
her civilization. Nine of them, covering 
an area nearly a third again as large as the 
whole of the United States, are in South 
America alone. 

Too often the nations of Spanish origin 




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in spite of their origin; if they remained 
"backward, " the fault must lie in their 
origin just the same. Again the factor of 
fair comparison has been lacking, and no 
account has been taken of the special cir- 
cumstances of environment as well as of 
inheritance with which their national 
growth has been attended. 

For all of these. obstacles to a real under- 
standing of the Spanish element in the 
history of America failure to study the 
sources is largely responsible. Until quite 
late in the nineteenth century the archives 
of Spain itself were not open to private 
investigators. The struggle for political 
stability and economic advancement in its 
former colonies that had become republics 
was too arduous to permit the necessary 
documents to be gathered, much less to be 
examined. War and civil commotions 
scattered, where they did not actually 
destroy, vast quantities of manuscript 
records. What survived, apparently, was 
a meager store of material, poorly kept, 
difficult of access, and rarely printed in 
critical editions. Such at least was the 




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common impression, strengthened only too 
often by the experience of investigators. 
If a student wanted to consult papers in 
government archives, he was apt to meet 
discouragement from bureaucrats who 
cared nothing about historical documents, 
except to wish that so much waste paper 
cluttering up the office could be thrown out. 
Public libraries, also, were few and their 
facilities did not invite serious work. Pri- 
vate archives, in the rare cases where they 
were known to exist, were beyond the reach 
of strangers, for the families who owned 
them had no desire to gratify anyone's 
curiosity on the matter. 

Given such conditions it is not strange 
that the writing of the history of Spanish 
America based on genuine research should 
have been rendered almost impossible. 
Worse still, the situation created a state 
of mind altogether averse to investigation, 
and this has subsisted to a marked extent, 
despite the improvements of recent years 
in the preservation, arrangement, and pub- 
lication of the sources. Lacking the real 
tools of their trade, the native historians 




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resorted to improvisations of one sort or 
another. They copied lavishly and care- 
lessly the assertions of their predecessors. 
Moved by considerations of partisanship, 
in some degree temperamental, in some 
degree the result of political strife and per- 
sonal rivalry, they singled out data favor- 
able to their particular viewpoint, ignored 
or distorted whatever opposed it, and in- 
terpreted alleged facts with a supreme dis- 
regard for the eternal verities. Resident in 
lands where passion and ink were good 
friends, where political ideas were apt to 
have the force of religious creeds, history 
to the average Spanish-American historians 
of the time seemed to be present rather 
than past politics, a matter not to be 
written about or discussed, unless it could 
be employed to justify preconceived 
notions or promote the public fortunes of 
Some individual or group. Indeed a sort 
of cult grew up about native historians, 
much as it did about national heroes. 
Because they declared that something was 
true, it must be true and none might 
question it. 




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Outside of Spanish America itself the 
relatively few writers who occupied them- 
selves with its history long failed to deter- 
mine the credibility of the materials they 
used. If they happened to choose the 
picturesque and romantic elements alone, 
they presented them with all the alluring 
glamour that gifted imaginations could 
conjure up, accepting the unchecked state- 
ment of early chroniclers as so much law 
and gospel. Often, also, these foreign his- 
torians utilized what they found as a means 
of stimulating prepossessions born of 
ancient grudges against Spain or of dislike 
for Spanish America. In any case they 
were prone to seek out the conventional 
and obvious ' ' authority. " Unaware of the 
circumstances under which the informa- 
tion had been assembled, they did little 
more than reproduce it in another language. 

Since Spanish America does not belong 
as yet to the well-trodden domains of his- 
torical writing, a venture into it is a some- 
what hazardous performance. Within its 
field of inquiry there is no such accumula- 
tion of reasonably authentic and well- 




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organized knowledge in English, French, 
and German, from which a prospective 
author can make needful selections, as in 
the commonly accepted divisions of his- 
tory. Outside of certain narrow phases 
that have been examined, no mass of stock 
information in print exists in any language 
other than Spanish. Even here its re- 
liability is apt to be questionable. For 
anyone, therefore, who is unfamiliar with 
Spanish to write a history of Spanish 
America would be about as sensible a pro- 
cedure as it would be for a Chinaman to 
narrate the history of the United States on 
the basis of Chinese ' ' authorities "I B ut an 
accurate knowledge of the language is not 
the only prerequisite. If the foreign his- 
torian is unacquainted with the character- 
istics of most of the Spanish-American 
writers, and with the circumstances under 
which they have assembled their data, his 
work cannot fail to reproduce the faults 
that they exemplify. 

Though the history of Spanish America 
has suffered from neglect and misrepresen- 
tation alike, the fact does not lessen the 




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fascination that it possesses for all who 
enter upon a field of study so hidden from 
the common view. Because of its very 
obscurity it has all those elements of mys- 
tery which arouse and hold human interest. 
That it has been misunderstood and ill- 
interpreted is a greater inducement still for 
attempting a task of vindication with all the 
ardor and eagerness of the seeker after 
truth, who recks nought of consequences so 
long as he can attain his goal. 

The story of Spanish rule in America, 
of the struggle for liberty from a foreign 
yoke, and of the rise and development of 
the eighteen republics that acknowledge 
the maternity of Spain suggests naturally a 
comparison in point of interest with the 
three similar phases in the evolution of the 
United States. No one who has sounded 
the depths of Spanish colonization can 
help feeling the intrinsic superiority of its 
attraction over the record of English activi- 
ties. The latter seems drab and dull beside 
it. Not only were the personages, scenes, 
and circumstances so utterly different, but 
the actual conditions brought about by 




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the closeness of contact between the Span- 
iards and the native inhabitants of America, 
contrasted with the aloofness that charac- 
terized the relations of the English with 
the Indians, and the significance of this 
divergence in attitude and policy for later 
ages, render a study of Spanish achieve- 
ments one of the most fascinating fields of 
inquiry imaginable. Above all, it is the 
persistence* of the Spanish type of civiliza- 
tion, its ideas and institutions, its tradi- 
tions and culture, its psychology, its cus- 
toms and usages, in the face of the Anglo- 
Saxon type, which compels attention. 
What were its fundamentals? How did 
they develop? Wherein lies the secret of 
the strength of the Spanish spirit which 
prevails to the south of the United States, 
over against the powerful influences, 
mental and material, that emanate from 
the huge domains of Anglo-Saxonism in 
North America? These are questions that 
have never been adequately answered. 

The Thirteen Colonies that severed their 
dependence upon Great Britain could all 
have been put into one of the smaller poli- 




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tical divisions of colonial Spanish America 
into what is now the single republic of 
Colombia. Their population at the time 
was probably not a fifth of the number of 
inhabitants then subject to the rule of 
Spain. Their actual struggle for indepen- 
dence, carried on in a tiny area and under 
a single leader, lasted little more than six 
years, whereas the revolt of the Spanish 
colonies under many leaders and ranging 
over a vast territory endured for nearly 
twenty years. And if thrilling deeds of 
heroism and all that in war appeals to an 
imagination that blends romance with re- 
ality are what is desired, they abound be- 
yond measure in the annals of the mighty 
conflict that caused the flag of Spain to be 
lowered forever on the western continents. 
Then, when the former dominions in the 
New World given by Columbus to Castile 
and Leon entered upon their republican 
independence, a story begins which is one 
of the most interesting in human annals. 
Nowhere on earth is there gathered to- 
gether such an array of states, politically 
separate and yet united in the essential 



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features of their civilization, as in Spanish 
America. Nowhere else can there be found 
such an extraordinary fusion of races with 
all that this signifies for the study of the 
share of each in molding national and 
popular character. It is the greatest 
sociological laboratory in existence. More- 
over, the vicissitudes through which the 
republics have passed in adapting their 
inheritance to new conditions; the problems 
of every description that have arisen; the 
manifold experiments that they have tried, 
the ways in which they have struggled to 
win recognition from their fellow nations 
and the manner in which such recognition 
has been accorded; the contributions of 
their type of life and thought to the civiliza- 
tion of the world at large; the opportunities 
that they offer to men of enterprise from 
every land — these are themes that require 
an adequate knowledge of the past before 
present conditions can be understood. 

Whatever can be done, accordingly, to 
focus public attention on the necessity of 
striking at the roots of the history of coun- 
tries representative of a civilization so 




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13 


different from ours and whose destinies are 
linked so closely with our own, deserves 
the heartiest recognition. Such a service is 
rendered by the Corbacho Collection of 
South American Historical Manuscripts. 
Exhibited three years ago in connection 
with the International Historical Congress 
at Buenos Aires, and very recently under 
the auspices of the Smithsonian Institution 
at Washington, it is now shown for the 
first time in New York. The entire collec- 
tion, housed in the residence of its owner at 
Lima, Peru, numbers upwards of three 
hundred thousand items. It is undoubtedly 
the largest and richest of its kind in private 
hands to be found anywhere in the Ameri- 
cas. Some two thousand of the rarest and 
most interesting documents are here 
exhibited. 

Serlor Jorge M. Corbacho, by whose 
courtesy extended through The Hispanic 
Society of America this wealth of historical 
material is made known to the public of 
New York, is a member of the Peruvian 
Congress. Grandson of one of the great 
leaders in the struggle for the independence 




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of his native land, he traces his ancestry- 
back to the proudest lineages of colonial 
times. It was the intimacy of his relation- 
ship to families whose careers were often 
identical with the history of Peru as colony 
and republic which gave him the impulse 
toward the work of collection. Endowed, 
also, with an unusually ardent sense of 
appreciation for records of the past, he 
entered upon a tireless search for material 
that might reveal how close the union of his 
kin and country was in patriotic thought 
and deed. Even as a boy of fourteen, at a 
time when other lads make hobbies of more 
ephemeral things, he interested himself in 
picking up as best he could various old 
documents that told about the achieve- 
ments of the men who laid the foundations 
of Spanish civilization in South America, 
and guided its evolution through the cen- 
turies that have elapsed since the days 
when Europeans first trod the shores of the 
southern continent. Beginning at home 
with the manuscripts that recorded the 
career of his own family and then of its 
relatives, immediate and remote, he gradu- 




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ally broadened his activities of research 
until he had traveled far and wide through 
Peru itself and into the adjoining republics 
of Bolivia, Argentina, and Chile. Un- 
daunted by a thousand and one obstacles 
of ignorance, uncertainty, inertia, suspicion, 
reticence, and reluctance, with which his 
pathway of investigation was beset, he left 
no means of access untried and lost no 
chance, however unfavorable it might seem, 
of adding a single item more to his 
stock. 

How Senor Corbacho uncovered the 
hiding-places of the manuscripts that he has 
brought together is a story that affords a 
glimpse into the quaint customs of colonial 
times which still survive in many parts of 
Peru. The chief sources of his collection 
are family archives and stray papers 
gathered up by the Indians. Among the 
five or six million people who live scattered 
over a region easily the size of seven of our 
largest western states, somewhat less than 
a fifth perhaps is of Spanish origin. It 
includes many a family whose ancestral 
tree branches off from the "conquistadores," 



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others descended from ancestors of high 
rank and station in the colonial service of 
Spain, still others from the protagonists 
in the drama of national emancipation. 
Revering the glories of long ago and ven- 
erating the memories of the men who had 
brought them renown, these families have 
striven zealously to preserve everything 
that might recall the achievements of their 
forefathers. They may dwell amid ob- 
scurity and poverty, secluded in a remote 
village or small town or in the narrow alleys 
or neglected streets of a city, tenanting a 
mansion which, though its gateway may be 
surmounted by an ancient escutcheon, is 
little more than a crumbling semblance of 
bygone splendor; and yet they piously set 
apart a room in which to keep their precious 
heirlooms. To these relics, whatever their 
nature, whether documents, portraits, 
furniture, articles of dress and adornment 
and the like, they cling with a tenacity 
which only the pressure of absolute want 
can loosen. Seldom shown even to intimate 
friends and still less to the casual visitor, 
many an object that would gladden the 



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heart of the collector of the rare and curious 
in art, history, and literature lies secreted 
away in the homes of the once wealthy and 
powerful, who guard the treasures of their 
traditions even while they struggle to eke 
out the bare requirements of physical ex- 
istence. Only to him who has a lineage 
comparable with their own is access per- 
mitted, and the possibility afforded of 
acquiring now and then some of these 
mementos of the past. It is from the archi- 
val repositories of the proud old families of 
Peru that Senor Corbacho has drawn 
many of the finest manuscripts in his 
collection. 

Less fruitful was his search among the 
Indians in mountain, hamlets and villages, 
far removed from road or railway. In the 
days of their ancestors, long before strange, 
bearded men-at-arms scaled the Andes and 
planted the banner of Spain on their heights, 
there was no knowledge of paper or of 
written characters. What the word of 
mouth could not convey was transmitted 
by a bundle of knotted cords of various 
colors and lengths. Thus it was, when 




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anything in the shape of a manuscript fell 
into the hands of the natives, they regarded 
it with superstitious awe. Were they to 
destroy it, vengeance from on high would 
surely be visited upon them. Unable to 
read or write and rarely taught to do so, no 
matter how and whither the influence of the 
European might penetrate in other respects, 
the bulk of the native inhabitants never 
became altogether accustomed to the handi- 
work of the men from another continent, 
who covered some unknown substance with 
mysterious signs that had an equally mys- 
terious meaning. When they served as 
soldiers in the colonial militia or revolu- 
tionary armies, for example, and happened 
to find a bit of paper with such characters 
on it, they stored it away in some nook or 
cranny of their huts and kept it religiously. 
Here Senor Corbacho unearthed many a 
priceless document, and secured it with 
infinitely less trouble than he had had in 
learning where it was, or in persuading 
the scions of ancient Spanish lineage to 
yield something out of their ancestral 
hoard. 




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For twenty-one years the still youthful 
collector has kept unremittingly at his task, 
and cherishes the hope that he may in- 
crease the total number of his manuscripts 
to a million. Though the materials as- 
sembled thus far relate very largely to Peru 
and Bolivia, along with much that concerns 
Chile, Paraguay, and Argentina, he seeks 
to have the scope expanded so as to in- 
clude all of the countries in Spanish South 
America. Whether he succeeds in his quest 
or not, it is his purpose, in 192 1, to present 
practically the entire collection as a memo- 
rial to his native land on the occasion of the 
centennial anniversary of Peruvian inde- 
pendence. Out of it he will reserve only 
those portions which are valuable merely 
for the autographs they contain or which 
refer solely to neighboring states. By 
means of historical and archeological in- 
stitutes, furthermore, which he proposes to 
create, and through the aid of the Society 
of Antiquaries which he has already 
founded, Senor Corbacho aims to carry the 
development of historical studies far beyond 
any point that has yet been reached in a 




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South American country through private 
initiative. 

The measure of advantage that Peru 
may derive from a gift of this sort, and from 
the manifold uses to which it promises to 
be put, is not easy to estimate. A nation so 
rich, not in natural resources alone, but in 
monuments and memories of a past that 
ranges back into dim, prehistoric ages — so 
bestrewn with such relics in fact as to be a 
veritable "land of ruins" — cannot fail to 
possess a tremendous power of attraction 
for both archeologists and historians. 
Since its public archives were in large part 
scattered and destroyed during the disas- 
trous war with Chile about forty years ago, 
the student finds among what it left com- 
paratively little to interest him and the 
existing facilities for investigation too de- 
fective to warrant serious effort. Now, 
with the huge nucleus provided by the 
Corbacho Collection and the activities 
that are to proceed from it, the situation 
bids fair to undergo a vast improvement. 
Should the. example thus set be followed by 
many other representatives of the ancient 




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families of the country who may see fit to 
part with their ancestral treasures in the 
interest of the advancement of science, 
Peru is assured of becoming a great 
center of organized research in Spanish 
America. 

The two thousand items selected by 
Sefior Corbacho for the purpose of the 
present exhibition may be divided chrono- 
logically into two classes: those having to 
do with the era of the " conquistadores " 
and with events or personages of a some- 
what later period, and those relating to the 
origin and development of the wars of 
independence. The latter are far more 
numerous. Geographically the collection 
is centered mainly about Peru and Bolivia. 
In making this choice out of the hundreds 
of thousands of documents in his collection, 
Senor Corbacho had the probable interests 
of Americans immediately in mind. He 
knew the pride that they take in the classic 
work of Prescott, which was the first to 
depict with all the masterly coloring of the 
artist inspired by his theme the valorous 
deeds of the Spanish conquerors who 


; 


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created for Spain an empire beyond the 
seas. Their remembrance, also, of the 
patriots of the American Revolution, he 
felt sure, would kindle a warm sense of 
sympathy for the patriots of South America 
who fought no less gallantly on behalf of 
national independence. 

By directing the attention of the Ameri- 
can people to the documentary sources of 
so large a portion of the history of our fellow 
republics to the southward, Senor Corbacho 
has rendered a great service to the cause 
of international friendship throughout the 
Americas. He has made plain the obliga- 
tion that rests upon our own countrymen 
and theirs to seek the truth where it may 
be found. He has pointed out the necessity 
of common effort between us to attain that 
knowledge of the present which only the 
authentic records of the past can supply. 
He has afforded us, finally, a vista through 
which we can look back upon the early 
history of European civilization in South 
America, and follow it onward through the 
stages of its development, culminating in 
the era of emancipation, when many a 




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youthful nation shook off, as our own had 
done, the political fetters that bound it to a 
land on the other side of the ocean, and 
started hopefully out upon its career of 
progress under the aegis of republican 
freedom. 



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